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Thursday, 16 July 2015

Colin Bullard completed his PhD in New Testament under Simon Gathercole a while ago. I really enjoyed reading Colin's reflections back after the viva. http://collinandcandice.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/the-viva.html

I discovered some pictures I took of the Bullards somewhere on my desktop. Great memories!

Thursday, 28 February 2013

Their father, Rev Andrew Murray was one of
several Scottish ministers who came to the Cape of Good Hope in the 19th
century and became ministers in the Dutch Reformed Church.

Why was a seminary established at
Stellenbosch in 1859?

Andrew and John Murray, who studied in both
Aberdeen, Scotland and Utrecht, Holland saw the need for an evangelical and
reformed seminary in light of the devastating liberalism in Holland at the
time. The latter under the leadership of the likes of the young W.C. Opzoomer
from Utrecht rejected things like Jesus' virgin birth, his miracles, bodily
resurrection and uniqueness. Jesus was followed for being a good moral example.
Also, God had to be stripped of his personal and supernatural attributes, and
became the panentheist god constructed by Karl C.F. Krause, whom Opzoomer
followed.

It is always special for me when a British
journal publish good and interesting theological stuff from South Africa.
Recently, the reformed Baptist journalReformation
Today (available here at Tyndale House, Cambridge) published an
article by Rev Erroll Hulse in which he reflects on the 19th century revival in
South Africa in which the Murray's played an important part. Two excerpts:

"Some
pinpoint the beginning of the 1860 revival in theCapeto a prayer by Dr Andrew
Murray Junior. It was so powerful and moving that it lit fires in the hearts of
those present. They took these strong convictions home to share with others.

It is important to note that gifted-pastor
preachers were given to the churches in theCape.
The best known of these was Andrew Murray Senior. For over thirty years he had
prayed specifically every Saturday night for revival. He had two sons, Andrew
and John, both of whom became well-known pastors".

The discussion of the 1902 revival in the Prisoner of War Camps is
absolutely amazing:

"After the Boer War
(1899-1902) the Afrikaners found themselves in a depressed and poverty-stricken
state. They had lost their farms and suffered terrible loss of life in the
notorious prisoner of war camps. 26,400 women and children died in those camps
through starvation and epidemics.

During the Boer War
which eventually consisted of 400,000 British soldiers seeking to overcome
about 80,000 farmers who were skilled marksmen. Captured Boer soldiers were
exiled to prisoner of war camps in Ceylon, India, St Helena and Bermuda. It was
there that they experienced very remarkable and powerful spiritual revivals.

They did not enjoy
telephone or e-mail communication. Research needs to be done to establish the
details of these revivals. We do however know how the revival began in Ceylon.
Two prisoners engaged in a quarrel. The British encouraged chaplains to
minister to the prisoners.and so it was that the resident minister exhorted the
two unhappy prisoners to go out to the field that they used for rugby football
and there pray together. They heeded this exhortation and came back later with
the testimony that the Holy Spirit had fallen on them. The next evening four
returned to that spot to pray together. They came back with the same report.
This proved to be the beginning of the revival with an ever increasing nightly
prayer meeting. When the war ended, it was calculated that 2,000 out of the
5,000 were committed to Christ".

So what happened after
the war?

"After the war the
seminaries were filled with men who dedicated themselves to the ministry and to
missions. A mighty missionary movement spread across Africa. Throughout her history a battle with liberalism has taken
place in the NG Kerk. Since the 1950s a downgrade has taken place. The
spiritual decline has been catastrophic. Unregenerate liberal professors have
been allowed to destroy the faith of the seminary students.

We must pray that the
Lord will give the gift of faithful leaders again. And we must pray that the
Afrikaans believers will study their history and again be blessed with
spiritual awakening".

Friday, 12 October 2012

Today 112 years ago, Frederick Fyvie Bruce, one of the most influential British New Testament scholars of the 20th century was born in Scotland. As a small tribute, I thought I will share two little excerpts of Tim Grass' biography of Bruce's life and academic work, published in 2011. Two specific sections caught my eye as I glanced over a few sections tonight. The first is the occasion of his presidential address, after being elected president of the SNTS in 1975 (with interesting comments about Ernst Käsemann's body language!); and the second, the lack of tension he experienced between his academic study of the Bible and his approach to the Bible in personal or church life:

"... in 1975 he became president of the SNTS ... His presidential address, delivered at Aberdeen, was on the subject of 'The New Testament and Classical Studies'. In it he contended that the classicists were uniquely placed to study the New Testament because it was part of the cultural world which was their field and because the skills required to do so were those which they used in studying ancient writings. As a test case he took the writings of Luke, and especially the book of Acts, arguing controversially for the essential historicity of the speeches recorded in it. His conclusion was that 'the Graeco-Roman contribution to early Christianity should not be depreciated as though it were an alien accretion upon the pure gospel' ... Bruce was probably well aware that his emphasis on the importance of the classical background and his attempt to achieve objectivity in his handling of the text would run counter to the more conceptually orientated and philosophically committed approach of many continental scholars, and that his lay status would not be approved of by some clerical scholars present, but his lecture was the best (his close friend Ward) Gasque had ever heard him give, 'bearing witness to his convictions as a scholar and as a disciple'. Ernst Käsemann, a distinguished if sometimes combative German scholar, was seen to grow redder as the lecture progressed, but it may be a mark of his respect for Bruce that he does not appear to have entered into debate with him at the conference" (p. 115).

The lack of tension between academic and church life
"The Christian acceptance of the Bible as God's word written does not in the least inhibit the unfettered study of its contents and setting; on the contrary, it acts as an incentive to their most detailed and comprehensive investigation" (p. 131 [F.F. Bruce, "Matter of Call" (letter), Christianity Today, 26 March 1965, p. 38]).

"I am sometimes asked if I am aware of a tension between my academic study of the Bible and my approach to the Bible in personal or church life. I am bound to say that I am aware of no such tension ... Naturally, when I discharge a teaching ministry in church I avoid the technicalities of academic discourse and I apply the message of Scripture in a more practical way. But there is no conflict between my critical or exegetical activity in a university context and my Bible exposition in church; the former makes a substantial contribution to the latter. At the same time, membership in a local church, involvement in the activities of a worshipping community, helps the academic theologian to remember what his subject is all about, and keeps his studies properly 'earthed'" (p. 131 [F.F. Bruce, In Retrospect: Remembrance of Things Past (London: Marshall Pickering, rev. edn, 1993)]).

* This pdf is a related lecture delivered at the John Rylands University Library with the title: "Is the Paul of Acts the Real Paul?".

Monday, 17 September 2012

I will never forget that rainy afternoon in Durham, England, when I, together with Nijay Gupta and two other students helped clear Prof James Dunn's loft. Prof Dunn needed a few students to help him remove the boxes stored in his loft, as he was preparing to sell his house and relocate to the south of England where his daughter lives. After we finished clearing the loft of all the dusty boxes, we had a nice cup of coffee in the kitchen, each having the chance to ask Prof Dunn a few questions. One of my questions went something like this: "Professor Dunn, which of the books you have written, do you regard as the most controversial?" Prof Dunn's answer? Christology in the Making. An Inquiry into the Origins of the Doctrine of the Incarnation, first published in 1980. I agreed with him, in part, because I analysed parts of his book for an essay on the pre-existence of Christ in Paul's letters for one of the modules for my MTh at the University of Pretoria. Agree or disagree, anyone working on the pre-existence of Christ in Paul, has to engage with Dunn's book.

With this in mind, I was delighted to see Chris Tilling's 2012 WUNT monograph: Paul's Divine Christology arriving here at Tyndale House this morning. Tilling dialogues extensively with the big names when it comes to Pauline Christology. They include the likes of Bauckham, Dunn, Fee, Garland, Harris, Hurtado, Martin, Schnabel, Schrage, Thiselton, Thrall, Waaler and Wright.

Here are a few bits and pieces of Dunn's interpretation of Philippians 2:6-11 compared with Tilling, as well as a short excerpt of the latter's findings to wet your appetite:

Dunn: "It may ... be that the pre-existence-incarnation interpretation of Phil. 2.6-11 etc. owes more to the Gnostic redeemer myth than it does to Phil. 2.6-11 properly understood as an expression of first generation Adam christology - one way of outbidding and countering the appeal of the Gnostic systems. How much truth is contained in the last comment is hard to discern. What we can say with more confidence is that the reading of these passages with the presupposition of a pre-existent heavenly redeemer resulted in a critical shift in Adam christology - a shift from christology of death and resurrection to a christology of incarnation - and not only in christology, but also in the concept of redemption which goes with it ... it is certainly arguable that all these subsequent developments are the consequence in part at least of losing sight of the original meaning and intention of the Adam christology" (James D. G. Dunn, Christology in the Making. An Inquiry into the Origins of the Doctrine of the Incarnation [SCM Press: London, 1989 2nd ed.], p. 128).

Tilling: "... if the passage [Phil. 2.6-11] was used as a hymn in the corporate worship of the early church ... then the singing of this 'hymn' about Christ would have constituted a feature of the 'corporate devotional practise of early Christians'. Dunn's rejoinder that the 'hymn' is 'not addressed to Christ, but gives[s] praise to God for Christ' would be more realistic if the biblical Psalms were always addressed to God and did not sing about God, which is, of course, regularly not the case. Besides, it is far from obvious that Philippians 2:10-11 must be addressed only to God, not Christ, especially as it is at the name of Jesus that every knee bends" (p. 127).

Excerpt of Tilling's findings: "... Pauline Christ-relation is a divine-Christology expressed as relationship. In light of this way of constructing and contending for a Pauline divine-Christology, the claims of Dunn, Casey and others who deny a Pauline divine-Christology were critically examined, and it was maintained that none of the arguments hitherto employed can carry weight. For example ... Dunn's notion that Paul's 'christological reserve' only slipped into high Christology occasionally, are seen to crumble under the weight of data concerning the Pauline Christ-relation, Paul's divine-Christology. This way of dealing with the data in terms of the divine-Christology debate arguably has certain strenghts. To name a few: not only does it build on undeveloped lines of thought in Fee's work, but it constructively engages with the Christ-devotion emphasis in Hurtado, and the relational notion of identity in Bauckham" (p. 256).

Monday, 10 September 2012

Over the past few years I've had the privilege of giving a few papers at German universities and having interesting discussions with German biblical scholars. I was recently struck after reading some of FF Bruce's thoughts concerning doctorate programs in Germany.

Tim Grass, in his 2011 "definitive biography" of Bruce states that the latter expressed a degree of wariness, even skepticism concerning German research doctorates. Apparently, in 1944, Bruce argued that German critical radicalism was due not to the national character in Germany, but to the doctoral dissertation system:

"As, generation after generation, German students submit dissertations for the doctorate of their faculty, they have the choice of confirming old views or presenting new ones. Naturally, more 'kudos' attaches to the publication of a new theory than to the re-establishment of an old one, and the most brilliant and ambitious students seek to put forth 'some new thing.' In some faculties the results of this tendency are wholly beneficial, but in such subjects as classical literature or biblical theology this is not always so. The number of probable hypotheses in these realms is limited, and these have long ago been exhausted, the chances are that improbable hypotheses will multiply" (p. 106).

Wednesday, 5 September 2012

"The whole existence of the early church was based on the belief that Jesus was no longer dead, but was alive and active through the work of the Spirit in the lives of his followers", writes John Drane in the 3rd edition of his very popular New Testament Introduction, which arrived here at Tyndale House, Cambridge this week.

But what exactly caused this "resurrection faith"? Apart from the claim that Jesus' actual physical body rose from the tomb, Drane discusses and critiques three alternative explanations. Here are a few bits and pieces:

1) The "resurrection fact" was a subjective experience

Drane: "The disciples ... were prepared to stake their lives on the fact that Jesus was alive. Many of them were brutally murdered for their faith, including Peter and other members of Jesus' inner circle, who would be prime suspects for having removed the body. It is highly improbable, if not impossible, to imagine that they would willingly have suffered in this way if all the time they knew where they themselves had hidden his corpse".

2. The "resurrection fact" was a theological creation

Drane: "There is no evidence from any source at all to suggest that the Messiah was to die, let alone rise from the dead. On the contrary, the Messiah was popularly expected to kill other people, and if he suffered and died himself, then by definition he was not going to be the real Messiah".

3. The "resurrection fact" was a later belief

Drane: "... there are the statements made by Paul in 1 Corinthians, written at least ten years before AD 66. By that time, one gospel had certainly been written, and furthermore, the gospel accounts were undoubtedly based on stories that went right back into the earliest days of the church. It makes no sense at all to suppose that belief in the resurrection was a late development".

Drane concludes the discussion saying that many other fanciful suggestions have been made from time to time to account for the "resurrection fact". "But", says Drane, "the overwhelming weight of all the evidence suggests that, however it might be described in cognitive abstractions, the 'resurrection fact' was a real, historically-located event. No other hypothesis gives an adequate account of so much of the evidence".

Revd Dr David Wenham, Vice-Principal and Tutor in New Testament, Trinity College, Bristol, has this to say on the back of the book: "This book has arguably been the most useful non-technical introduction to the New Testament available... A best buy for the student or lay person wanting a readable and reliable first handbook on the New Testament".

I was delighted to find a reference to Mark S. Goodacre's The Synoptic Problem at the resources section at the back of the book. Hopefully we can put the alleged plagiarism issue raised by Goodacre behind us. Peter Head, Sir Kirby Laing Senior lecturer in New Testament from Cambridge's response to the issue on Goodacre's blog might help in this regard....

Radboud University, Nijmegen

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BLOG AIM

The aim of this blog is twofold:

1) To network with postgraduate students, theologians and academics interested in i) the resurrection of Jesus; ii) its implications for Paul, Luke and the early church; iii) and how we should interpret and apply it in our day.

2) To share information about conferences, lectures and special events in Cambridge (and other UK faculties), Nijmegen, Mainz and Munster.